Flatpicking Guitar Magazine

Free Flatpicking Lesson - February 2020

“Down in the Willow Garden”

Arranged by Mickey Abraham

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Hello and welcome once again to Flatpicking Guitar Magazine’s free lesson portion of our monthly newsletter. This month I offer a simple arrangement of “Down in the Willow Garden.” This song is truly one of the most classic and beautiful melodies of all time. There are countless renditions done by so many great musicians. Among my favorites are the new-age version played by Darol Anger and Mike Marshal as well as the great crosspicking version done by James Alan Shelton. You may encounter this song by its other name “Rose Conley.”

For this lesson I choose to keep the arrangement simple and melodic. Once you get the melody and chords in your mind I’m certain you will have fun adding little chordal embellishments to it. While “Down in the Willow Garden” does not lend itself to hot improvisation, it does leave a lot of room for chord strums in between the melody notes. One of the most interesting parts of the melody is in the B section at measure 18. I love how the line drops from the open G string down to the 3rd fret of the A string. This is a large intervalic jump and is one I would be highly unlikely to play if I were improvising a melodic line over these chords. To me, it is moments like this that make melodies unique and special.